A columnist in the Asheville Citizen-Times recommended that we all vote against all incumbents in Congress. 

Interesting.

My son-in-law did in fact vote against all incumbents, period, in the 2010 election.  I’m sure he left the polls with a bounce in his step, having struck a blow for liberty or something.

Fifty-six percent in an NBC poll said they would like to replace the whole Congress. The favorability rating of generic “Congress” hovers around 13 percent.  That’s down there with the numbers that think President Barack Obama is a libertarian.  

Congress is our scapegoat, our whipping boy, the fall guy in this time of government nothingness. 

 But do they deserve it? 

Some individuals and groups in the present Congress certainly deserve all the scorn and vitriol we can muster as a people. But generic “Congress” is as much victim as it is villain. Some blame should lie with the Founding Fathers. 

The Founding Fathers, in their wisdom, devised a system of “checks and balances” that was designed to keep one branch of government from becoming dominant over the other two. Congress passes laws, but the president must agree. The president proposes laws, but Congress passes them.  This is the “checks” half of the system.

 Another motive the Fathers had, if I recall Miss Bredenberg correctly from sixth grade, was to encourage the branches of government to cooperate.

And that’s what has happened, with few exceptions, over the life of our nation.  President and Congress have worked out differences for the good of the country.  This is the “balances” half of the system.

The Founding Fathers feared tyranny, but they overdid it.  It’s a lot easier, you see, to “check” than it is to “balance.”  

The system they devised has the tools for mischief built right in. If somebody wants to take up these tools for checking an opponent, they’re right there, ready to use.

That’s what happened last year in the generic “Congress.” Republicans set as their basic strategy to stonewall Obama and keep him from even the smallest crumb of success. They accomplished this by checking the president’s every move. They opposed and played games.

In the process they destroyed, for now, the credibility of Congress — but they see that as a small price to pay for destroying the credibility of the president.

This year’s election will show they didn’t succeed. 

The vote-‘em-all-out rhetoric should be aimed squarely at Republicans for their shameful antics in 2011 — not at the whole Congress. But then again, 2012 is going to be a landslide year for Democrats. So hey, knock yourselves out. 

 •

Lee Ballard lives in Mars Hill.